• An American Airlines flight collided with a helicopter, raising questions about air traffic control.
• Sen. Tammy Duckworth, a former Black Hawk pilot, said military and civilian pilots usually do not speak directly to each other.
• The FAA faces a shortage of controllers, impacting high-traffic areas like Washington DC.

The crash of an American Airlines flight in Washington, DC, has renewed anxiety about air-traffic control staffing and procedures at US airports, especially in crowded airspaces.

As investigators began to piece together how a military helicopter collided with the regional jet, questions swirled about communication between the pilots and Reagan National Airport's control tower.

Sen. Tammy Duckworth, an ex-Army Black Hawk helicopter pilot, told reporters that military aircraft usually do not talk directly to commercial pilots, as ATC is the responsible intermediary.

"Everybody's listening on the same frequency," she said, adding that the American flight that crashed would have been aware of the Black Hawk helicopter in the skies. "You are listening to instructions from ATC. ATC is telling you what to do."

Duckworth said an FAA briefing involving ATC tapes revealed the helicopter pilots were told about the passenger plane, and the crew confirmed "at least twice" that they had the jet in sight before the crash.

She added that the American flight was cleared to land and would have had the "right of way" and that the Black Hawk was told to pass behind. The flight was in visual flight conditions, meaning the helicopter would be visually searching for the plane.

"They would be looking up to try to find this aircraft, pick it out of the sky as it's coming in for a landing," she said.

According to the Federal Aviation Administration, some military and civil aircraft, if equipped, can talk to each other using specific emergency frequencies. This is usually reserved for distress situations where immediate communication is necessary. It's unclear if the Black Hawk was equipped.

"[The Black Hawk's] flight path should have been hugging the east bank of the Potomac River, so they should not have been within the flight path of that landing aircraft," she said. "Did one of the aircraft stray away latitude, sideways in the airspace from the route that they were supposed to be on?"

National Transportation Safety Board member Todd Inman said the DC area is a unique environment for helicopters and that the Black Hawk was transitioning zones at the time of the crash. ATC is one of the "human factors" the agency will examine as part of its investigation, he said.

Air traffic control is a complex system with many moving parts and no room for errors

The national air traffic system in the US is immense in both size and complexity, 14,000 air traffic controllers handle upwards of 45,000 flights a day across 29 million miles of airspace.

It's an intricate network that includes hundreds of regional and area control centers, each responsible for a specific piece of airspace.

A pilot flying from San Francisco to Washington, DC, for example, could interact with more than 20 different controllers during the flight.

The job is infamous for its high stress and heavy workload, which can involve managing upwards of a dozen flights at a time.

These stressors are amplified for airports like Ronald Reagan National. The airport has strict flight paths and altitude restrictions. It handles more than 25 million passengers a year and is located in highly trafficked and highly controlled airspace, as it is near the White House, Pentagon, and other government buildings.

The airport has seen multiple near misses recently, including a Southwest Airlines flight that was instructed to cross the same runway on which a JetBlue plane was starting its take-off.

A month later, an American Airlines flight was cleared for takeoff at the same time another plane was given the go-ahead to land on an intersecting runway.

Controllers working the airspace in and around Reagan National also have to handle an extraordinary amount of private and military aircraft that operate in the area.

The situation is exacerbated by a shortage of around 3,000 air traffic controllers, which the FAA has worked to address with plans to hire 1,800 controllers in 2024 and 2,000 this year.

• United and Delta are expanding flights to Europe to capitalize on strong travel demand.
• United and Delta are running 23% and 13% more flights to Europe compared to 2019, respectively.
• Both airlines are upping their European presence with new transatlantic routes.

Airlines say Europe remains among the biggest money-makers going into 2025 as people eagerly flock to more international destinations.

United Airlines and Delta Air Lines said in recent earnings calls that they are deploying more seats than ever to Europe to take advantage of the booming travel demand, which has remained strong since the COVID-19 pandemic halted overseas vacations.

In the fourth quarter of 2024, United's passenger revenue to Europe increased 9.5% compared to 2023, with just a 2.3% increase in seat capacity.

Delta saw a 4% increase in transatlantic passenger revenue during the same period, despite a 2% reduction in capacity. (Delta's figures include Europe as well as half a dozen destinations in Africa and the Middle East.)

Both airlines have increased their planned transatlantic presence further into 2025, operating more than 100,000 flights total between the two, well above prior years according to data from Cirium.

Europe is no longer just a seasonal hot spot

Andrew Nocella, United's executive vice president and chief commercial officer, said during Wednesday's earnings call that Europe is becoming a "year-round destination" after being a less valuable revenue stream during off-peak months in previous years, like between January and March.

"Now we're seeing a totally different result, where people are willing to go on a Southern European vacation," he said. "And that really helps de-seasonalize Europe."

Nocella later said United expects quarter one to boast the best transatlantic financial performance in its first-quarter history.

He added that stronger hub connectivity with Star Alliance partner Lufthansa in Germany and money-making business traffic returning to London Heathrow are also helping United across the Atlantic.

Delta expressed a similar sentiment about Europe's desirability as a year-round destination for US travelers, specifically noting the strong dollar's additional buying power and the smaller crowd sizes compared to peak holiday periods.

"You go to a restaurant in New York and then go to a restaurant in Europe, you'll see a vast difference in the bill," Delta president Glen Hauenstein said in the airline's January 10 earnings call. "This is a great time to travel to Europe. People are seeing that."

The Atlanta-based carrier also said it does not believe strong off-peak season demand for transatlantic flights this winter will eat into consumers' appetite for summer travel.

Bernstein analyst David Vernon maintained a buy rating for United following its earnings report, saying international flying and premium services are particularly driving revenue.

CFRA Research analyst Ana Garcia said the firm expects United to see continued profitability. She said earnings are "buoyed by network optimization and operational improvements."

United's stock is up about 13% year-to-date, while Delta's is up about 9%.

New routes to Europe from United and Delta in 2025

United has become so bullish on Europe that it plans to launch new routes to off-the-beaten-path destinations in 2025 that aren't offered by competitors.

For example, this summer, the carrier will fly nonstop to Palermo, Italy, Faro, Portugal, and Nuuk, Greenland. These flights will complement United's already extensive transatlantic network, which includes flights to more than 30 European cities from the US.

Expected deliveries of the long-haul single-aisle Airbus A321XLR — the first expected in January 2026 — will help United push further into Europe as the jet can fly routes previously unprofitable with a widebody or unreachable with older narrowbodies. It will replace the airline's aging Boeing 757s.

Still, United said widebody supply constraints, including for airframes and engines, will impact its long-haul operations through at least the end of the decade.

The carrier has placed orders for 150 Boeing 787 Dreamliners and expects to receive 11 in 2025. That is down from the 18 expected in February 2024 .

Delta has not purchased the A321XLR, and it flies only a handful of Boeing 757 aircraft across the Atlantic.

The airline instead relies on a large fleet of older Boeing 767 and newer Airbus A330 and A350 widebodies to run more than 700 flights a week to 33 European destinations.

This summer, Delta will add new routes to locales in southern Europe, such as Barcelona and Catania and Naples in southern Italy.

• A judge rejected Boeing's plea deal with US prosecutors over 737 Max crashes.
• The deal involved Boeing pleading guilty to fraud and paying a $243.6 million fine.
• Boeing previously agreed to a $2.5 billion settlement with the Department of Justice in 2021.

A federal judge on Thursday rejected a July plea deal between Boeing and US prosecutors, citing concerns with the role diversity, equity, and inclusion would play in selecting an independent monitor.

In his decision, Judge Reed O'Connor expressed doubts about Boeing's and the government's ability to select the monitor solely based on capability without consideration of race. The judge noted both groups' strong focus on DEI in their operating policies.

"In a case of this magnitude, it is in the utmost interest of justice that the public is confident this monitor selection is done based solely on competency," the judge said in his decision. "The parties' DEI efforts only serve to undermine this confidence in the Government and Boeing's ethics and anti-fraud efforts."

The Texas judge O'Connor also criticized regulators' work overseeing Boeing's progress under the deferred prosecution agreement it signed in 2021, writing in the decision: "It is fair to say the Government's attempt to ensure compliance has failed."

The case stems from two Boeing 737 Max crashes that killed 346 people, the first with Indonesia's Lion Air in October 2018 and the second with Ethiopian Airlines in March 2019. Faulty software was found to be the culprit in both crashes.

Victims' families opposed the plea agreement, voicing displeasure with the process for selecting an independent anti-fraud monitor and the fact that Boeing's compliance with the monitor's recommendations is not a required condition of its probation, court documents noted.

"This is an excellent decision by Judge O'Connor and an important victory for the victims' families," Erin Applebaum, a lawyer representing 34 families of victims lost on the Ethiopian Airlines flight, told Business Insider.

"We anticipate a significant renegotiation of the plea deal that incorporates terms truly commensurate with the gravity of Boeing's crimes," she added. "It's time for the DOJ to end its lenient treatment of Boeing and demand real accountability."

Boeing did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

In July, Boeing agreed to plead guilty to fraud, pay a $243.6 million fine, and allow an independent monitor to oversee safety and quality control at its factories.

However, regulators said Boeing violated that settlement after the January Alaska Airlines door plug blowout. The deal was set to expire two days after the Alaska incident.

In May, the Justice Department said Boeing had failed to "design, implement, and enforce a compliance and ethics program."

In 2021, Boeing reached a $2.5 billion settlement with the Department of Justice and families of the victims in January 2021 to settle charges of fraud conspiracy related to the fatal crashes.

Boeing's former CEO, Dennis Muilenburg, was fired in December 2019 and was replaced by Dave Calhoun. Calhoun later stepped down in March 2024 after the Alaska blowout.

New Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg, who started in August, has been tasked with overhauling the company culture and getting Boeing back on track with safety and its production targets.